How Many of the Red Sox Managers of Your Lifetime do you have a Visceral Hatred for?

[Rasputin]

For me, going in reverse order, it's:

Bobby Valentine
Grady Little
Jimy Williams
Kevin Kennedy
Butch Hobson
John McNamara

That's half of them.

I just...how can you be that bad at your job? Grady made the single worst coaching decision in the history of sport. Jimy Williams' actions were indistinguishable from someone who wanted to lose. Kevin Kennedy let Tom Gordon throw like three hundred pitches a game. Butch Hobson was just fucking incompetent. And John McNamara can just fuck off right into the sun.

 

[Lose Remerswaal]

Here is a list of the managers for the past 60 years, to help with our addled memories



For me, out of those, the guys I wouldn't walk up to and shake their hands at a bar would include:

Kasko
Zimmer
Johnny Mac
Butch Hobson Joe Morgan (it wasn't his fault but he was SO highly touted)
Jimy
Grady

Not Valentine because it wasn't his fault he was put into that role and had to follow Tito. He was what he was and he wasn't going to become someone else in one year in Boston


I started following in 1966

EDIT: I said Joe Morgan in error, meant Butch Hobson. No idea how I confused the two.

 

[Van Everyman]

Joe Morgan (it wasn't his fault but he was SO highly touted)

What the fuck do you have against Joe Morgan?

 

[Rasputin]

Not Valentine because it wasn't his fault he was put into that role and had to follow Tito. He was what he was and he wasn't going to become someone else in one year in Boston

He's a walking pile of shit and I hope he gets crabs.

 

[Archer1979]

Zimmer has got to be at the top of the list. Sox should have ended the drought in '78 if his ego/style hadn't gotten in the way. Atrocious handling of the pitching staff (Bobby Sprowl starting instead of Bill Lee???).

For example...
Decent chance that they would have had a healthy Bill Campbell for the full year if Zimmer had half a clue that just because a human being is making ungodly money doesn't necessarily mean that he's immune to overwork. I think Zimmer had a quote that since Soup was making $1MM, he would make him earn it.

 

[Lose Remerswaal]

What the fuck do you have against Joe Morgan?

Wow did I mess that up.

I meant Butch Hobson. Not sure how I got that so totally wrong. Leaving it up to dunk on but will add an edit

 

[Rasputin]

I meant Butch Hobson. Not sure how I got that so totally wrong. Leaving it up to dunk on but will add an edit

I was at a game where Mike Greenwell and (I think) Mo Vaughn were getting a day off and they somehow got the bases loaded with two shitty hitters coming up and he refused to pinch hit just because of the handedness of the pitcher and we didn't score and the next inning the other guys switched pitchers and he pinch hit with them both and now I hate him and his coke addled brain.

 

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

Valentine
Little
Williams
Kennedy
Hobson
McNamara

 

[sodenj5]

Bobby Valentine for me. Grady Little might have cost the Sox a shot at a banner, but he also brought us Tito.

Valentine was a train wreck literally everyone saw coming from a mile away and the actual results were somehow even worse.

 

[nattysez]

I don't think I hate anyone on the list. Every indication is that Valentine is a little crazy and a huge a-hole, but I don't hate him.

That said, going through the managers who I remember (which starts with Zimmer) for this exercise only reemphasized to me how incredible Tito is. There is not one other guy on that list other than Cora who I'd call an above-average manager, and Cora didn't exactly cover himself in glory this year.

 

[Gash Prex]

None? The only one I came close to hating was Bobby Valentine.

 

[lexrageorge]

First manager I remember was Eddie Kasko. I don't hate him at all; the young core of the 1973 Sox team was starting to show some real promise and won 89 games. And he did admirable work as scouting director after he was replaced.

So, the most hated of the remainder (chronological order):

Darrell Johnson - rewatch the 1975 World Series sometime and see how many outs he ran into on the base paths and other managerial blunders. Bill Lee was right.
Don Zimmer - Bobby Sprowl. Bill Lee was right about him as well.
John McNamara - His treatment of some of the players on that 1986 team (Sammy Stewart for one) was reprehensible. #3 on my list.
Butch Hobson - I hate him the most, and it's not close between him and 2nd place (Joe Kerrigan) to be honest.
Kevin Kennedy
Jimy Williams
Joe Kerrigan - would have destroyed Pedro's career if given the chance
Bobby Valentine - 'nuff said about him already

Surprising omission:

Grady Little - I could never bring myself to hate the guy; just didn't think he was qualified to be manager in the modern era.

 

[Minneapolis Millers]

Hatred is a bit strong. Hugely disappointed with? Little, McNamara, and Zimmer f’d up good teams/golden opportunities.

 

[snowmanny]

For me, going in reverse order, it's:

Bobby Valentine
Grady Little
Jimy Williams
Kevin Kennedy
Butch Hobson
John McNamara

That's half of them.

I just...how can you be that bad at your job? Grady made the single worst coaching decision in the history of sport. Jimy Williams' actions were indistinguishable from someone who wanted to lose. Kevin Kennedy let Tom Gordon throw like three hundred pitches a game. Butch Hobson was just fucking incompetent. And John McNamara can just fuck off right into the sun.

I know you were waiting for someone to say Kerrigan. I didn't like Kerrigan much.

I agree with your list. This is why I am loathe to fire anyone decent. So many are so so bad. Wish they'd kept Francona but Cora is good enough.

 

[pedro1918]

Bobby Valentine and Joe Kerrigan are the only two I really hate.

There are others I strongly dislike.

 

[gammoseditor]

The players really hated Joe Kerrigan. Lou Merloni had a good story. They were on the road and a few of them were at the hotel bar. Kerrigan stops by and says he’d pick up a drink before heading up to bed. After he leaves they ordered Louis XIII on his tab.

 

[Ale Xander]

McNamara and Valentine and that’s it actually. Maybe Jimy Williams

 

[StupendousMan]

Cora might have been an effective manager of the Sox, but I find it hard to forgive his actions with the Astros.

 

[Pablo's TB Lover]

1986 was probably my first year of being a diehard fan. I am actually going to give one or two dummies a pass only because the question was who I have a "visceral hatred" for. To me, that means being a bad manager plus terrible to everyone (fans, media, their players).

Zimmer: I wasn't intimate with his malpractice while an infant, but based on how we acted with the Yankees he must have been a real asshole with the Sox.
McNamera: Thought he was the smartest guy in the room just because he had a trio each of all-world hitters and a studly top end of the rotation.
Hobson: His managerial records looked unimpressive in the minors but because former player(?) he brought his smug self up to Boston.
Kennedy: The fact that he left the dugout then stayed in the broadcast booth from there forward tells you all you need to know.
Kerrigan: Maybe this is a "me" problem with the mustachioed ones. But he was the definition of a "know-it-all" and try-hard.
Valentine: 'Nuff said.

I left Jimy and Grady off. I think Jimy was prickish but kind of a product of the Duquette roster construction and prevailing media relations. Grady was just not smart under pressure, but he was the ideal regular season manager for that team. The pivoting out of closer-by-committee and elevating Papi out of the 1B/DH platoon so quickly are feathers in his cap.

 

[bankshot1]

Visceral hatred?

None.

There were guys I didn't like and thought they were shitty managers, like The Gerbil and Valentine, who did some real damage to the team, but i'm not sure I hated them. Even Grady Little I didn't hate. But he confused the sgit out of me.

My first skipper was Pinky Higgins, a racist crony of Yawkey's. If I had known that then (I was 5 or 6) I might have hated him.

 

[Archer1979]

I've got to think that how old you are plays a factor. Being a witness to some of these trainwrecks as opposed to reading or hearing about them may make all the difference in the world in the feelings that it invokes.

 

[benhogan]

Zimmer...1978 still stings, it shouldn't... but does

 

[Bergs]

Don Zimmer.

Then. Now. Forever.

Valentine in 2nd place.

 

[Van Everyman]

Wow did I mess that up.

I meant Butch Hobson. Not sure how I got that so totally wrong. Leaving it up to dunk on but will add an edit

Ha – I was wondering how you could burn with a fiery rage at nice old Joe yet left Hobson off.

Granted he was interim but always loved the story about how Joe Kerrigan drove all the way to Manny’s house in Florida to patch things up – and Manny refused to answer the door.

Baseball feels like the only sport that has these kinds of stories.

 

[wiffleballhero]

All I know is that even after I was told that, you know, it is a bad look for a professional athlete to be tossing an 80 year old on the ground, I thought, "yeah, well, I wish Pedro had decked him harder."

 

[nighthob]

For me, going in reverse order, it's:

Bobby Valentine
Grady Little
Jimy Williams
Kevin Kennedy
Butch Hobson
John McNamara

That's half of them.

I just...how can you be that bad at your job? Grady made the single worst coaching decision in the history of sport. Jimy Williams' actions were indistinguishable from someone who wanted to lose. Kevin Kennedy let Tom Gordon throw like three hundred pitches a game. Butch Hobson was just fucking incompetent. And John McNamara can just fuck off right into the sun.

Were you born in 1979?

 

[snowmanny]

The lack of hatred here confuses me.
These are supposed to be professionals who make the best decisions possible to improve the chances of winning a game. And bringing me joy. They decided their egos were worth more than my joy.

If you leave Bill Buckner in at first because you want the vet to be in the field for the celebration you are abdicating your responsibility.

If you leave Pedro in when everybody else knows he’s cooked you are abdicating your responsibility.

If you’d rather have the corpse of Bob Bailey than Bernie Carbo I don’t know what to say.

Yes I hate them all. Why not?

 

[NomarsFool]

Grady Little. One of the stupidest managerial decisions I have ever seen, and he did it because he was a total coward who wanted to lose with his "best pitcher" on the mound. This isn't me second guessing, I was screaming at the television to take Pedro out. Thankfully we got another chance, but certainly didn't know that at the time. I also loathed Jimy Williams and his stubborness in the guise of country bumpkinism.

Bobby Valentine was a disastrous choice, but I don't really put that on him. I blame management for that.

 

[voidfunkt]

Bobby Valentine mostly. I wasn't big on Farrell after 2013... his grumpy baseball veteran shtick didn't do much for me.

Grady Little's gonna get a lot of hate but other than his fuck up I don't remember too much negatively about him.

So yea... Bobby V...

 

[nighthob]

My first skipper was Pinky Higgins, a racist crony of Yawkey's. If I had known that then (I was 5 or 6) I might have hated him.

You're thinking of Pinky's boss, Joe Cronin. Higgins undoubtedly had terrible views on race from his upbringing in the Jim Crow south, but when he had full control of the team they began integrating. He wasn't a good GM to be sure, but Joe Cronin he wasn't.

 

[Oil Can Dan]

Grady Little's gonna get a lot of hate but other than his fuck up I don't remember too much negatively about him.

I mean sure, but it was a massive fuck up. He literally denied Pedro finally slaying the MFY. Pedro did it. Grady undid it.

Massive. Inexusable.

I hated Valentine and have issues with the others but it's Grady and Grady alone for me despite all of that because he denied Pedro perhaps his finest moment ever in an amazing HOF career.

 

[jmcc5400]

Valentine, Zimmer, Mac.

 

[Rasputin]

Were you born in 1979?

1970, but I didn't start watching until 1986.

 

[Rasputin]

The lack of hatred here confuses me.
These are supposed to be professionals who make the best decisions possible to improve the chances of winning a game. And bringing me joy. They decided their egos were worth more than my joy.

If you leave Bill Buckner in at first because you want the vet to be in the field for the celebration you are abdicating your responsibility.

If you leave Pedro in when everybody else knows he’s cooked you are abdicating your responsibility.

If you’d rather have the corpse of Bob Bailey than Bernie Carbo I don’t know what to say.

Yes I hate them all. Why not?

Yeah, I don't get it either.

I broke my keyboard after Grady's Boner.

 

[Red(s)HawksFan]

McNamara
Kerrigan
Valentine

Little was terrible but except for that one fuck-up, I can't say I viscerally hate him. He was incompetent but not quite hateable. The three I chose were assholes. McNamara not only fucked up numerous things during the 1986 post-season, he couldn't be bothered to admit maybe mistakes were made. He went to his grave insisting everything he did and every choice he made was right. Fuck that guy. As others have mentioned, Kerrigan didn't even have the respect of his players. I loathed that 2001 team by the end, Kerrigan being a big part of it, and I very nearly gave up on being a Sox fan (the prospect of new ownership is the only thing that kept me around). Valentine was a disaster from day one and everyone knew it but him, Lucchino, and Cafardo. Like with McNamara, he has never acknowledged he screwed up. According to him, he was a manager of the year candidate in 2012. Fuck that too.

 

[Bergs]

All I know is that even after I was told that, you know, it is a bad look for a professional athlete to be tossing an 80 year old on the ground, I thought, "yeah, well, I wish Pedro had decked him harder."

Right? I was at a bar in Ohio and some Yankees fan was like "oh, really classy," to which I responded something along the lines of "fuck that piece of shit, I wish Pedro kicked his fucking teeth out. I've wanted him dead for longer than you've been alive." That particular Yankee fan didn't have much else to say to me.

 

[Pilgrim]

Bobby Valentine mostly. I wasn't big on Farrell after 2013... his grumpy baseball veteran shtick didn't do much for me.

Grady Little's gonna get a lot of hate but other than his fuck up I don't remember too much negatively about him.

So yea... Bobby V...

Grady completely fucked up the 2002 team, too. Everyone just forgets about that because it’s overshadowed by 03. Wasted Cy Young seasons from Lowe and Pedro and missed the playoffs with a 100 phythag win team. They lost pretty much every close game that year, just totally gutless.

 

[chrisfont9]

Grady Little might have cost the Sox a shot at a banner, but he also brought us Tito.

That's rather generous. He is #1 on my shit list. Just completely blowing a title as we all watched in horror. I don't know anyone who wasn't screaming at their TV. If a guy basically gets himself fired in the middle of an ALCS game, he's gone the extra mile.

 

[chrisfont9]

McNamara
Kerrigan
Valentine

Little was terrible but except for that one fuck-up, I can't say I viscerally hate him. He was incompetent but not quite hateable. The three I chose were assholes. McNamara not only fucked up numerous things during the 1986 post-season, he couldn't be bothered to admit maybe mistakes were made. He went to his grave insisting everything he did and every choice he made was right. Fuck that guy. As others have mentioned, Kerrigan didn't even have the respect of his players. I loathed that 2001 team by the end, Kerrigan being a big part of it, and I very nearly gave up on being a Sox fan (the prospect of new ownership is the only thing that kept me around). Valentine was a disaster from day one and everyone knew it but him, Lucchino, and Cafardo. Like with McNamara, he has never acknowledged he screwed up. According to him, he was a manager of the year candidate in 2012. Fuck that too.

Kerrigan was awful but that team wasn't winning anything regardless.

 

[donutogre]

I’m going to make an embarrassing admission. I wasn’t terribly into baseball or the Sox prior to 2003. I moved to Boston for college in 1999, but wasn’t much of a sports fan. But by 2003, there was no avoiding it, and one of my best friends in the city was a big Yankees fan (one of the good ones, like JonAbbey. He taught me a lot). So naturally we were throwing a lot of shit at each other as the season got more and more intense ,and I ended up watching game 7 at his house. I was overjoyed when Clemens was gone after the 4th, and when the Sox held a decent lead.

I didn’t have the long history of knowing Pedro’s injuries and diminishing effectiveness at this point. But even I knew that he had done his job after the 7th. I don’t care how god-like he was / is. It was just time to take him out, and my stupid, brain dead baseball-ignorant ass knew they were making a big mistake. That was an incredibly memorable night for the wrong reasons, but there really is very little in the sports world like the intensity of the 99-05 Sox / Yankees rivalry. Good times!

 

[chrisfont9]

I’m going to make an embarrassing admission. I wasn’t terribly into baseball or the Sox prior to 2003. I moved to Boston for college in 1999, but wasn’t much of a sports fan. But by 2003, there was no avoiding it, and one of my best friends in the city was a big Yankees fan (one of the good ones, like JonAbbey. He taught me a lot). So naturally we were throwing a lot of shit at each other as the season got more and more intense ,and I ended up watching game 7 at his house. I was overjoyed when Clemens was gone after the 4th, and when the Sox held a decent lead.

I didn’t have the long history of knowing Pedro’s injuries and diminishing effectiveness at this point. But even I knew that he had done his job after the 7th. I don’t care how god-like he was / is. It was just time to take him out, and my stupid, brain dead baseball-ignorant ass knew they were making a big mistake. That was an incredibly memorable night for the wrong reasons, but there really is very little in the sports world like the intensity of the 99-05 Sox / Yankees rivalry. Good times!

I don't think I can participate in this thread any more. GODDAMMIT GRADY YOU FUCKING MORON!!

 

[snowmanny]

Little was terrible but except for that one fuck-up, I can't say I viscerally hate him. He was incompetent but not quite hateable.

Game 2, Kapler leads off the game with a single. They call a hit and run which leads to a strikeout/CS double play. Nomar and Manny follow up with hits but nobody scores. Yankees win.
Game 3 Manny(!) on first, they call hit and run that leads to an inning ending strikeout/CS double play. Yankees win.
Game 4 Nixon leads off with a single. They call a hit and run that leads to a strikeout/CS double play. Sox win anyway.

I am pretty sure I hated him after the first one. But tell me who in the universe would do a hit and run with Manny on first and Ortiz up?

 

[WheresDewey]

Hatred is too strong a word, but I'll never have a nice thing to say about Zimmer or Valentine.

 

[cornwalls@6]

Valentine was really the only one that fits the category for me. A complete train wreck. And an insufferable ass. Honestly, not sure I hated anyone else. Grady fucked the dog, but I kinda understood his old school thinking, even if I completely disagreed with it. Joe Kerrigan might come closest on an interim basis. Just 10 miles over his head, and the last guy to know. My dad passionately disliked Houck. Can't say I shared it, but it was entertaining listening to his broadsides against Ralph on many a summer night on the patio.

 

[nighthob]

Right? I was at a bar in Ohio and some Yankees fan was like "oh, really classy," to which I responded something along the lines of "fuck that piece of shit, I wish Pedro kicked his fucking teeth out. I've wanted him dead for longer than you've been alive." That particular Yankee fan didn't have much else to say to me.

In the game thread at the time I observed, “It’s good to see that some things never change and Gerbil still doesn’t know how to handle a pitcher.”

But seriously, that idiot had no place out there.

 

[Bergs]

Game 2, Kepler leads off the game with a single. They call a hit and run which leads to a strikeout/CS double play. Nomar and Manny follow up with hits but nobody scores. Yankees win.
Game 3 Manny(!) on first, they call hit and run that leads to an inning ending strikeout/CS double play. Yankees win.
Game 4 Nixon leads off with a single. They call a hit and run that leads to a strikeout/CS double play. Sox win anyway.

I am pretty sure I hated him after the first one. But tell me who in the universe would do a hit and run with Manny on first and Ortiz up?

Not to mention how fond he was of pinch running and defensive replacements too early in games. He was awful. But I don't VISCERALLY hate him. Or at least I didn't think I did until I started writing this post. Hmmm....

 

[Wallball Tingle]

I’m going to make an embarrassing admission. I wasn’t terribly into baseball or the Sox prior to 2003. I moved to Boston for college in 1999, but wasn’t much of a sports fan. But by 2003, there was no avoiding it, and one of my best friends in the city was a big Yankees fan (one of the good ones, like JonAbbey. He taught me a lot). So naturally we were throwing a lot of shit at each other as the season got more and more intense ,and I ended up watching game 7 at his house. I was overjoyed when Clemens was gone after the 4th, and when the Sox held a decent lead.

I didn’t have the long history of knowing Pedro’s injuries and diminishing effectiveness at this point. But even I knew that he had done his job after the 7th. I don’t care how god-like he was / is. It was just time to take him out, and my stupid, brain dead baseball-ignorant ass knew they were making a big mistake. That was an incredibly memorable night for the wrong reasons, but there really is very little in the sports world like the intensity of the 99-05 Sox / Yankees rivalry. Good times!

This is almost word for word my fandom story (right down to the year of moving to college and the year of fandom beginning and the Yankees fan friend!) except college was in Connecticut.

Anyway, fuck Grady Little. Like pretty much every human who watched that game, I was fucking floored he didn't pull Pedro after the 7th. He was laboring and barely had enough to escape that inning with the lead he had at the time; he was clearly cooked. Yankees fans I was watching with couldn't believe it either. That blew. I'm so sorry for Sox fans who died between the end of that season and the end of the next one.

Valentine really sucked too, but I don't think replacing him with Tito or Farrell would have made that much of a difference. Damn, I can't believe that horror show ending of 2011 led right into that miserable season and that self-congratulatory weirdo manning the ship.

 

[bankshot1]

You're thinking of Pinky's boss, Joe Cronin. Higgins undoubtedly had terrible views on race from his upbringing in the Jim Crow south, but when he had full control of the team they began integrating. He wasn't a good GM to be sure, but Joe Cronin he wasn't.

Nope. From what I've read of Higgins he was a pure racist who kept the Sox segregated and white for as long as he could. He was an integral part of the Sox sad legacy of racism. As we all know, managerial fuck-ups are part of the game, but racism and hatred shouldn't be. As a kid in the 50s, I really wasn't aware of the racism of the Sox, but as I got older I learned.

 

[cornwalls@6]

Right? I was at a bar in Ohio and some Yankees fan was like "oh, really classy," to which I responded something along the lines of "fuck that piece of shit, I wish Pedro kicked his fucking teeth out. I've wanted him dead for longer than you've been alive." That particular Yankee fan didn't have much else to say to me.

Amen, Brother. God that used to piss me off so much when the MFY fans in my life would do the moral outrage bullshit about Pedro and Zip. Don't run out into a fight if you don't want to get hit grampy. The "classy yankee" idiocy is a virus that can't be killed.

 

[donutogre]

This is almost word for word my fandom story (right down to the year of moving to college and the year of fandom beginning and the Yankees fan friend!) except college was in Connecticut.

Anyway, fuck Grady Little. Like pretty much every human who watched that game, I was fucking floored he didn't pull Pedro after the 7th. He was laboring and barely had enough to escape that inning with the lead he had at the time; he was clearly cooked. Yankees fans I was watching with couldn't believe it either. That blew. I'm so sorry for Sox fans who died between the end of that season and the end of the next one.

Valentine really sucked too, but I don't think replacing him with Tito or Farrell would have made that much of a difference. Damn, I can't believe that horror show ending of 2011 led right into that miserable season and that self-congratulatory weirdo manning the ship.

Love it. Where’d you go to college?